


Of Monster and Men

by thelongcon (rainer76)



Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: 3:08 x 3:09, Episode Tag, Gen, Multiple character pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-16
Updated: 2014-05-16
Packaged: 2018-01-25 00:23:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1622309
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainer76/pseuds/thelongcon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Daryl, this was Merle.”   Glenn can barely breathe, ribs grating against one another like broken fingers, his body collapsed against the tiled floor.  "It was."</p><p> Set in and around Made to Suffer and the Suicide King - this is gen - but with a heavy dose of Daryl & Rick, because that's the way I roll.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Monster and Men

**Author's Note:**

> Dialogue from the episode Made to Suffer was written by Robert Kirkman, dialogue from the Suicide King was written by Evan Reilley and reappears here (in part and in full) without permission. There's no real point to this rehash - just bored on a rainy afternoon, I guess - be warned there's multiple points of views running throughout this story, you may run the risk of whip-lash.

“Daryl, this was Merle.”  Glenn can barely breathe, ribs grating against one another like broken fingers, his body collapsed against the tiled floor. Maggie rests beside him, pale as a vampire, her eyes ringed and dark with concern, Rick is planted directly in front, crouched on one knee.  Daryl paces the outskirts, having checked the rear of the building, almost completely out of Glenn’s sight, and so it is Glenn notices Rick’s reaction first, the way his head snaps upward, his attention utterly focused, the way his body jerks minutely.  Glenn nods once, blood in his mouth and one tooth loose.  “It was.”

“You saw him?” Rick demands, tension in every line.

“Face to face.  He threw a walker at me, he was going to execute us.”

The hate turns acidic, eating Glenn from the inside out, blurring his vision as he tries to breathe.  The noise outside is loud, spurts of shouting as the alarm is raised, a rising cacophony of confusion, of stuttered questions, as people stagger from their homes and onto the street.  Oscar twitches the patch-work quilt covering the window aside. Firelight throws grotesque shadows against the wall before he closes it; silently, Oscar snatches a discarded hoody from a nearby chair and passes it to Maggie. Daryl seems to lose the strength in his arm, the crossbow dropping precariously - his steps are a sideways creep, coming in from the edge - disbelief etched on his features. “You’re saying my brother is this governor?”  Daryl’s voice doesn’t sound his own, like he’s swallowed stones.

“No, somebody else,” Maggie corrects. She’s focused on getting the hoody on Glenn’s frame, pulling his arms into the sleeves and covering his bare torso, trying to delay the onset of shock, her voice clipped. “Your brother is his lieutenant or something.”

“Does he know I’m still with you?”

“He does now.  Rick, I’m sorry, we told them where the prison was, we couldn’t hold out.”

“Don’t, there’s no need to apologise.” Rick hasn’t dropped his gaze from Glenn; he hasn’t looked toward Daryl even once. He touches Glenn’s knee briefly then spins on his heel, heading toward the window in a crouch - the blame doesn’t lie with you, goes unsaid - Glenn felt it anyway, a press of reassurance against his too hot skin when Rick touched him, the way everyone’s trying to ignore the elephant in the room for more pressing concerns.

“They’re going to be looking for us,” Maggie interjects. Her fingertips linger, charting the storm-clouds that have blossomed on Glenn’s chest, trying to measure the extent of the damage.

“We have to get back, can you walk; we’ve got a car three miles out?”  The distance hadn’t seemed far when they snuck in; but looking at the rough shape Glenn and Maggie are in now, Rick feels he could have parked in a different state for all the good it does.  They can’t stay holed up in here forever, the longer they delay, the bigger the search party will be, the greater the Governor’s retaliation. 

“I’m good.”  Glenn plants his palm against the dirty floor, levers himself upward with a wince, Maggie, her shoulder positioned under his arm-pit, provides support. He’ll damn well crawl if needed; Glenn can’t get away from Woodbury fast enough.  He should have shot Merle, he thinks savagely, the moment the man appeared in his sight-line, arms upraised and his voice all country-bumpkin, he should have shot Merle dead before Daryl ever found out. Glenn’s not big on what-if’s and should-haves, he’s not keen on revisiting past decisions, but he can’t shake Maggie’s image from his mind, stripped half-naked, covering her own breasts, and the anguish on her face as the governor sniffed the line of her neck, as he threatened to end Glenn’s life, as Merle pulled those hoods over both of their heads.

Daryl jerks, the years stripped from his voice until he sounds like a teenager, he heads toward Rick with alacrity, trying to stall him. “Hey, _hey_ , if Merle’s around I need to see him.”

“Not now - we’re in hostile territory.”

Daryl shakes his head, adamant.  “He’s my brother, he’s not gonna – “

“Look at what he did!” Rick rasps, the evidence before him; Glenn lists to one side, his body mottled with bruises, torn and bloody.  Daryl flinches, the desperate flare of revived hope shrinking as Rick presses close, invading his personal space, voice coiled tight.  “We got to get out of here, _now.”_

“M-maybe I can talk to him, work something out – “

“No.  You’re not thinking straight.  No matter what they say they’re _hurt_ , Glenn can barely walk, how are we going to make it out if we get over-run by walkers, if this governor catches up to us?”  Rick doesn’t have time for compassion, he lays it out flat, each point designed to hit home, to penetrate, he lets the urgency bled into his voice, lays it bare because Rick has never lied to Daryl, never tried to screw with his head or play mind games with him; this is how it is between them. This is the way it’ll always be. Their communication is spare and honest, it leaves no room for embellishment.  “I _need_ you. Are you with _me_?”

Because Merle, this Governor that he runs with - they have all the numbers in the world – the streets feel claustrophobic to Rick, overflowing with humanity.  Rick doesn’t have the same luxury, the people he claimed, took responsibility for, kept alive over a cold winter aren’t expendable to him.  Rick’s not going to let any of them go without a fight. He curls his hand tight around Daryl’s bicep, touch underscored with words and not a hint of mendacity anywhere. Daryl sways, body at odds, tilted away like the leaning tower of Pisa. Rick lets him, Daryl sometimes sees clearer from a distance; sometimes he needs the extra space to get a read on someone. He looks unguarded and raw to Rick, balanced on a precipice as Rick waits for his decision, as the seconds fly by.

Daryl nods jerkily.  “Yeah,” he demurs, but something closes down in his expression, shuts off, the brief glimpse of vulnerability locked away and out of Rick’s reach forever.  “Yeah.”

It’s enough.

Rick fumes, already focused on the door.  _Merle, fucking Merle Dixon_ , it was like he was put on the earth to be a spanner in the works, tapping Rick on the shoulder with a shit-eating grin and a one-fingered salute from the past. “On three, stay tight with me,” he says aloud, eyes flicking from Daryl to Glenn, sweeping from Maggie to Oscar, one hand on the door handle and Michonne conspicuously absent.  He doesn’t know if he’s leading his people into an ambush or a trap, doesn’t have a clue where her loyalties lie or what her agenda is, but they can’t linger any longer.  “One, two, three,” he counts down, sotto voce, and leads his people onto the street.

It’s mayhem, they hustle down the road with Glenn caught in their midst protectively, darkness and flickering firelight conspire to play tricks on the mind, they make it past a number of the militia before someone calls out haltingly.  “Who are you?  Wait! _Wait_ ” Before the game is up and the first spat of gunfire cracks the pavement in front of them.

“Behind you,” Daryl shouts.  He spins on his heel, advances to the rear with his rifle spitting bullets, covering Glenn’s retreat, giving Rick time to scout the street until he finds an alcove between shop-fronts.

“In there, go, go, go!” Rick waits until they’re bundled, until Daryl fires a last round, and then tugs the man into the safety of the narrow entry.  Daryl ejects the clip from his rifle, slams another one home, and makes room for Oscar beside him.  “How many?” Rick barks.

“Didn’t see,” Oscar intones, he peers around the corner into the smoke-filled street; indistinct bodies run from one advantage point to another, like a colony of ants that have been poked with a yardstick, no order to speak of.

“Doesn’t matter,” Daryl growls.  “There’s going to be more of them, we need to move.”

“Got any grenades left?”

“Yeah.” Daryl sights down the rifle, his expression distant, bordered up as a foreign country.

“Get them ready,” Rick orders,  “we’re going over the wall.”

“You guys go ahead.” Daryl hands over the bag of weapons to Oscar, keeps a few of the smoke-grenades for himself, stashed in his pockets, and says off-hand. “I’m going to lay down some cover fire.”

Rick hesitates, his eyes darting toward Daryl, a sense of crawling suspicion running down his spine.  It’s Maggie who speaks for him, who voices the words and the sentiment behind it.  “No. We’ve got to stay together.” If they’re going over the wall then they’re going as a unit, no one left behind.

“Too hairy.”  Daryl doesn’t spare a glance at any of them, doesn’t look anyone in the eye.  “I’ll be right behind you.”

 _Trust him_ , Rick urges himself, trust he’s not going to do something foolish, that Daryl meant it when he said he was with Rick – chose Rick - that he’d protect his people over Merle’s group, trust him, because there aren’t any other options left.  Daryl looks at him finally, eyes narrowed, his face angled planes, sharp as a diamond and just as rare. 

“Go!” Daryl orders, and then Rick’s running; Oscar and Maggie, Glenn beside him, the night whizzing with bullets and the aborted screams of the wounded.  He sees Oscar fall, dying even as he throws Glenn onto the roof of the bus, he sees the nightmare of Shane come out of the darkness with his shotgun loaded; and puts him down again – the same way Rick’s put him down in a thousand remembered nightmares – he scrambles over the nose of the school bus with bullets ricocheting all around.  “Daryl!” he yells, trying to discern the archer’s position, and then drops over the side when the only answer is the trajectory of heavy metal – the _ping, ping, ping_ – of bullets impacting.  He lands in a half-crouch, knees folding, the rifle-butt jabbing into his shoulder as he drops his finger from the trigger-guard. 

Maggie’s there to haul him upward.  “Daryl?” she asks into the shell of his ear.

Rick shakes his head.

 

*** 

 

It wasn’t a lie, Daryl tells himself, he said he’d cover them until they made it over the wall and he did.  It wasn’t a lie because Rick told him what needed to be done even if he hadn’t realised it - _What happens if the governor catches up?_ Rick, Maggie, Glenn, Oscar - if they made it over the wall then the governor’s men would flow over the boundary like hunting dogs, baying on the hunt, they’d chase them into the woods with _nothing_ to distract them, and with Glenn hobbling the way he was – the inevitable recapture _was_ a fact. He’s not betraying Rick, or compromising the promise he made, but that’s his brother out there – that’s _Merle_ \- and of all the distractions Rick has available to him Daryl’s the one with the biggest impact.

He hears Rick yell his name, crouched on the bus rooftop, his voice tearing through the chaos. 

Daryl stands; sharp staccato bursts from his rifle light up the night, revealing his position, and then bolts like a rabbit.

“Over there!” someone shouts.

Daryl’s never had the patience for long-term plans, he wasn’t big on chess or any of that shit Rick liked; and the only rule of thumb he has going right now is simple: stay alive, lead the Governor’s men on a merry chase until Rick, Maggie, Glenn, and Oscar are _far_ away, then find Merle and surrender before the bastards kill him. 

Merle is the ace up his sleeve – _the Governor’s lieutenant,_ Maggie described him as – Daryl’s interrogation and capture will give Rick plenty of time to get away, to put space between himself and Woodbury, and as the Governor’s right-hand-man, the sway Merle carries with these people will keep Daryl alive until he convinces his brother to leave this asshole behind. It’s a tentative plan, it relies entirely on Merle’s standing with these people, it relies on Daryl’s ability not to get killed in the next five minutes, and it relies on a hell of a lot of luck.  He feels like a cat on a hot tin roof, trying to antagonise these assholes so their attention is fixed on him, trying to judge that moment when he can surrender (or run out of bullets, whichever comes first) without being beaten to death the moment he yields. He’s shit-scared and alone, and he can admit it now that no one is watching.

But he isn’t leaving Woodbury without seeing his brother.

 

***

 

It’s Milton who finds him, running from bolt-hole to bolt-hole with his forefinger fixed between his eyes, trying to keep his glasses from sliding from his nose.  Milton’s face is waxy pale and his eyes are saucer plates as he throws himself onto the ground beside Merle, scuffing his knees in the dirt. “It’s the Governor,” he pants. “You’re needed. Now.”

Merle casts the pansy-ass a look, he’s never taken orders from Milton well; they rub each other wrong, like a grater on carrot Merle just wants to tear him to shreds. “Busy here, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

The volume of gunfire has subsided, near as Merle can tell, most of the posse jumped the wall – and Merle would be on their asses like a rash if there wasn’t a fox in their henhouse – keeping his militia jumping at shadows and damn near killing each other with friendly fire. “He’s hurt,” Milton explains, as if that takes precedence over everything.  “He asked for you.”  Message delivered, the governor’s errand-boy back-pedals away from the mayhem, running toward the medical bay, as if he has no stomach for it.

Merle watches him flee.

Martinez peers around Crichton’s shoulder, baseball bat in one hand and an Austyler in another.  “We’ve got it,” he assures. 

Their fox has taken refuge in McKinney’s house, the militia’s already broken into two groups, approaching from opposite sides. Merle frowns, staring at the kill zone. “Keep him alive,” he orders, the words bitten off and chewed out.  They’re not raiders these attackers - they didn’t go for food or weapons - they went for the Chinamen and his piece of tail, which means the posse came from the prison and that’s as close to Daryl as Merle’s been in over a year. “Beat him unconscious if you need to, but keep him alive.  You keep him _here_ until I get a chance to question him.”

Martinez shrugs, grip tightening on the baseball bat. “Whatever you say, boss.”

Merle isn’t all that concerned when he darts away. The only body on the ground is a nigger in prison garb, and the only connection Merle has to those assholes at the prison is his brother, soon as Officer Friendly’s dead, the problem’s taken care of.  Andrea might get her knickers in a twist, but truth is, she’d been pretty cool about the possible existence of Rick and company, even opting to stay in Woodbury rather than reunite with Michonne, or follow her girlfriend into the wild.

With any luck, that black bitch would be a thousand miles away by now, or better yet, being torn asunder by walkers, and with her banishment Merle’s in the clear, no record of wrong-doing on his ledger.  He follows Milton into medical without the faintest clue his entire world was about to tumble down. 

He walks into the room to face the glacial fury of a one-eyed Governor –insanity glares back at him - and somewhere in his bones, Merle _knows_ lucky-luck has ever had it in for him.

 

***

 

“Come on, Daryl,” Rick urges. 

They’re hovering when they should be running, hauling ass back to the car with Glenn caught between them, but Rick can’t bring himself to leave, he feels like he’s soldered to the ground, feet turned to lead; spotlights sweep through the bush to either side, turning the landscape alien, awash with silver light and stark shadows, the nameless horrors that creep between. Woodbury is a tirade of rushing noise, of voices calling back and forth in a panic.

A sharp rustling to the left brings Rick’s Python up automatically, hope falling foul to anger as Michonne staggers into view. Maggie hisses, crouched low with her rifle as she abandons Glenn’s side.  “Where in the hell were you?” Rick rasps.  He advances, a homicidal anger thrumming through his veins as he spins Michonne around.  “Put your hands up, turn about.”  The pat-down is cursory – her eyes are dilated – blood runs down Michonne’s forehead in a steady stream and her movements are off-kilter, staggering like a drunkard, or someone with a severe concussion.  She doesn’t resist in the slightest, and if she’s a spy, then she’s not on the Governor’s payroll.  Rick eyes the damage, lip curling into a snarl. “Get what you came for?”

“Where are the rest of your people?” Michonne sounds as dazed as she looks, her eyes running over the small huddle of people.

“They got Oscar.”

“Daryl’s missing.”  Maggie presses.  “You haven’t seen him?”

Michonne barely had time to shake her head in a negative before Rick was on her, the threat in his voice like a living, breathing entity - separate and deadly - barely contained by his body.  “If _anything_ happens to him I’ll – “

“I brought you here to _save_ them,” Michonne interrupts, cutting the threat off before the imagery can take hold, nodding toward Maggie, toward Glenn lying motionless on the ground, reminding Rick why they came in the first place.  _Bullshit,_ Rick wants to say, _you brought us here to run decoy, to distract the militia, so you could slip away and play assassin, except your plan didn’t run so smoothly, did it, and everybody else’s plan fell like stacked dominos because of it._

“Thanks,” Rick says icily, the sarcasm layered through every word, “for the _help.”_   

He doesn’t know what his expression reveals, the animal in Rick’s ribcage feels like ash and fire, it feels like talons that would render the landscape bloody.  Michonne’s eyes widen fractionally, the attitude she sported since arriving at the prison flayed away, leaving only truth. “You need _help_ to get them back to the prison - or to go find Daryl - either way, you _need_ me.” Killing her by the wayside isn’t an option, and not a word of what Michonne said sounded false. The anger stutters and flares, doused by hard facts - of the four of them, Rick and Michonne are the only ones remaining who know where the car is hidden – and any chance Rick has of finding Daryl will be circumvented by time if he has to drag Glenn three miles to the hidden location and run back again, anything could happen during that delay.

Michonne raises her chin defiantly, eyes steady.

“Rick?” Maggie says, uneasy.

“If you screw with me,” Rick says, skin and bones stretched to creaking, trying to contain the rage into a veneer of civility. “Then I will hurt you in ways you can’t imagine.”

“I won’t,” Michonne promises.

“What - ?  _No,”_ Glenn protests. He bats away Michonne’s hand, trying to peer around her until he can find Rick in the darkness. “I can’t leave Maggie here alone. You don’t know what he – “

“Glenn,” Maggie cuts in.  “Rick needs back-up, and we’re not leaving Daryl in their hands, not after everything that happened.”

“He’s with _Merle_ – “

“He’s with _me_ ,” Rick corrects – or so Daryl said – and Rick needs to trust him on this, Daryl isn’t someone he can afford to lose, and Rick isn’t in the habit of making hollow promises.  “I don’t leave my people behind – she’ll be safe, you have my word.”

“I’ll keep myself safe,” Maggie retorts, over-riding them both.  “I didn’t care much for their hospitality the first time round.”

Glenn’s face contorts, becomes pleading. “Then we _all_ stay.”

“Not viable; when they get Daryl out they’ll be running – you and I – we’re going to need the head-start,” Michonne says into the silence, her words simple.

Glenn’s expression crumples like wet paper, the adrenalin that’s kept him afloat washed away from sinew like a tide, he folds over, gasping for breath.  “I’ll be fine,” Maggie promises, and touches his cheek, pushes the dark hair from his eyes, kisses the swelling bruise on Glenn’s mouth.  “I’m fine.”

“Come back,” Glenn mouths, soundlessly. “Come back to me, please.”

Rick turns away, giving them what privacy he can afford.  He fixes his gaze on Michonne, a thousand yard stare with a gunslingers dead aim. “I have him,” she says in response, and helps Glenn to his feet, disappearing into the surrounding bush without another word. It’s up to Rick to find and recover Daryl – now that Glenn is safe – the archer is his only priority.

Maggie eyes the bag of weapons Daryl carried through the melee – that he gave to Oscar before staying back to buy their retreat – the same bag Maggie took when she ended Oscar permanently, firing one round into his forehead, and crouches to reload her rifle.  She glances over her shoulder in a perfunctory manner. “You have a plan?”

There are tear tracks on her cheeks, runnels in the dirt and grime that can only be seen in a certain light, her voice is steady and her fingers reload the weapon without the faintest quiver. Whatever did – or didn’t happen – in Woodbury, Maggie’s now focused on the immediate, and she’s done it more successfully than Glenn.  _It’s stress relief,_ Maggie had once proclaimed, her eyes overly bright.  _If a guy bursts into tears he has to run in the opposite direction to make sure no one sees, too embarrassed to function; girls don’t care, crying’s just an outlet and a healthy one at that; it doesn’t mean I’m incapable of doing what needs to be done._

There’s nothing incapable about Maggie Greene, Rick thinks faintly. “We stirred up a hornets nest; any person in their right mind would be fleeing for the hills right about now.”

Maggie quirks an eyebrow: “But you’re not in your right mind?”

“Not in the slightest,” he agrees, grimly. “With luck, Woodbury and its citizens are confused, angry, and looking to reconsolidate their sense of power. They won’t be expecting another attack this soon.”

“And that’s our window?”

“A slim one at that.”

“Let’s hope lady luck favours you, then,” Maggie says critically, and eyes the perimeter.  “We should find ourselves a mouse hole.”

 

***

 

 _Betting on Merle’s standing_ , Daryl self-mocks (he’s the governor’s lieutenant, Maggie had said, holding the same position Daryl held with Rick, players on a chessboard of two opposing kings), and wonders if he ought to have revisited that assumption before acting, because Merle’s standing was ever questionable. 

He chokes on dust, the stale smell of fear and vomit. He wonders for a moment if the bag over his head is the same one Glenn wore – or some other bound victim – he can’t get his balance, shoved and pushed, both wrists tied behind his back. His cheek is cut open from the knuckle-dusters that dropped him, his shirt and buttons torn to near ruin, the material binding his arms almost effectively as the rope around his wrists. There’s a rising tide of screams, shouted insults and a braying for spilt blood, it sounds like there’s a million people gathered in the arena just to watch Daryl die, and over all of that, the voice of the faceless fucker who calls himself Governor carries with the gravitas of a politician. 

“One of those terrorists is one of our own!  Merle!  The man I counted on, the man I trusted.  He led them here.  _He let them in!_   It was you, _you lied_ , betrayed us all!”

Collusion and some made up charge to rile the good people up – to make whatever goes down here more palpable - Daryl doesn’t have a clue what Merle’s done to anger the nut-job, but the only ‘standing’ his brother has left is a stinking shit-heap, and Merle’s in it to his waist.

“This is one of the terrorists!” the Governor roars, and Daryl’s shoved forward.  He staggers like a newborn foal, feet planted wide, doubled over so he doesn’t fall.  He can’t fight like this, he can’t even retaliate, shoulders wrenched backward and visibly blinded. Daryl can’t catch his breathe, the screams of the crowd run through his head like a freight train, he can’t stop those little sideways steps, fight/flight amped up until it’s consuming him.  He’s scared, more scared than he’s been in his entire life, and Daryl won’t be able to hide it when Merle sees him, it’ll be writ over his face, plain as writing.

“Merle’s own brother!” the Governor continues, and the hood covering Daryl’s head is whipped off, like revealing a prize on a game show, all flair and showmanship.  He catches his first glimpse of the man, the Governor is ordinary in appearance, tall, his teeth are fixed in a white smile as he toils the crowd into a frenzy.  “What should we do with them, huh?”

Merle is standing opposite, body out of proportion with one arm shorter than the other.  There’s a steel cap over his wrist, his face gaunt and hollower than Daryl remembers.  Daryl blinks the dust from his eyes, chest heaving like a bellows; he takes three steps left, then one right.  Closer as he drinks his brother in, further away as the crowd chants _KillKillKill_ like extras to a fucking Mad Max film. “Kill them both!”

“You wanted your brother,” the Governor smirks, and motions for Daryl’s wrists to be cut loose from the bindings.   “Now you got him.”

Merle has a peculiar way of going still – his expression unreadable – Daryl can’t read him like that, he can only brace for the on-coming hurricane, hope Merle knows he went back to Atlanta, leaving him behind was never on the table for Daryl – except Merle was already gone – and leaving _Daryl_ behind was a habit his older brother had never broken, not once since childhood. Daryl’s come to expect nothing less, not from anyone.  All he had to do was wait; all he had to do was trust Daryl wouldn’t leave his back unguarded on the Atlanta rooftop for long.  Now it’s been days, blurring into months, transgressing into years, and his brother looks carved from stone.  He stares at Daryl, at the fear that keeps his respiration uneven, keeps his feet shuffling, as if Merle can sense a hesitancy of a different sort. Truth is, Daryl doesn’t know for sure _what_ Merle will do – all he knows is the building pressure of a storm-front, a hurricane wind of violence – all he can see is the metal stump of his brother’s amputated hand.

“You all know me,” Merle finally announces, and turns to face the crowd, using that same three-ringed circus tone the Governor had - his voice designed to carry.  “You know I’ll do whatever I’ve got to do, to prove my loyalty to this town.” He sinks his fist into the pit of Daryl’s stomach, hard enough to knock him right off his feet, as if Merle wants to tear his belly apart and pull his guts out one loop at a time. Daryl’s still trying to suck in air from the ground when the boot comes flying out of nowhere, elevating him half an inch off the dirt and spinning him across the arena like a flip-top. And then Daryl’s shutting down, shutting off, like he’s done in a thousand different fights, external stimuli diminished like the lights in a dimmed house.  He lashes back, throws out a punch that almost breaks Merle’s jaw, and hears the arena roar with approval.

 

 

 

***

 

It’s Maggie who takes the first kill-shot - the second and the third as well - for a bare fraction of a second she held Merle in her sights, and then Daryl rotated into her scope, the two brothers back to back as they looked for a way out.  Maggie adjusted her aim and shot a woman in a baseball cap and tight shorts instead. Rick hurls a smoke-grenade and the gathered crowd scatters – arrogant in their assumption of safety – their walls torn down twice in one night. Maggie thinks they’ve forgotten what it is to be hunted; she thinks the Governor looks more at peace than she’s ever seen him, languid in his casual walk.  Rick flicks his torchlight on, hunkered near wooden crates as he guides Daryl to their position, and then both Dixon brothers hurtle by. “Let’s go, let’s go.” Daryl says, as way of greeting, and doesn’t stop running.

Helpless, because this wasn’t the plan, Maggie turns to Rick beseechingly.

Merle takes the lead, guiding them to another entry, ringed by sheets of corrugated iron and backed up by another broken bus, yellow paint peeling into gunmetal grey, all the windows bordered over. “They’re all at the arena - this way.”

“You’re not going _anywhere_ with us,” Rick snarls.

“Do you really want to do this now?” Merle counters. He sounds easy, not threatened by Rick’s ire in the least, there’s a wild glee in his eyes as Merle rushes outside to deal with the walkers on the outskirts of Woodbury. Daryl meets his gaze once, his expression shuttered and wary.

“Come on, man.  Rick, _come on_ , we gotta go.”

*** 

They move through the Georgian bush at a fast clip, Rick in front, followed by Merle, Daryl, and Maggie, and he thinks there is a weird psychology at work, Rick’s only comfortable with Merle directly behind him because he _knows_ Daryl’s there to jump on his brother if he tries anything.  And he thinks Daryl’s only comfortable standing behind Merle, because he’s trying to ensure Maggie doesn’t shoot Merle in the spine, a homicidal line of leap-frog with checks and balances everywhere - and Rick needs to be front and centre - because Glenn and Michonne are a whole different ballgame.  Rick calls out when they’re still out of sight of the car, a low whistle that cuts through the air and alerts them to in-coming.

“Glenn!” he hisses.

“Maggie!” Glenn returns.  “Thank god!”

Either the boy has a one-track mind or his hearing is off-line too. Rick pulls a face, and catches a brief glimpse of Daryl’s brief head-shake from behind.  Normally, Daryl would make a smart aleck remark about how _everyone_ in the crew had the habit of mistaking Rick’s voice for Maggie’s, but they’re all strung out too tightly for humour now.  Rick holds up a hand, curls matted to his forehead, sweat dripping from his frame, and warns.  “Now we got a problem here…I need you to back off.”  The hand might as well have been the red flag of a matador.

He’s charged from two directions at once, Daryl drops his rear position for one up front post haste, shoulder to shoulder with Rick, the two of them a physical barricade and trying their best to deflect pointy stabs and wobbly guns while Merle leans up against a tree-trunk and cackles.  “What the hell is he _doing_ here!” Glenn shouts.

“Hey, hey, back off!” Daryl slaps the gun to the left, knocking Glenn’s aim askew.

“He tried to kill me!” Michonne counters from the opposite side, and tries to slide the katana between both their bodies.

“Drop the sword.” Rick draws his own gun, the Python directly in her face, as the voices override one another in a symphony of hate.

“If it wasn’t for him we’d never be caught!”

“He helped us get out of there!  Now drop it!”

“Yeah,” Rick agrees waspishly, and fixes Daryl with a sideways glare.  “Right after he beat the _shit_ out of you!”

“Hey, we both took our licks, man,” Merle retorts, from the safety of the tree.

“Jackass,” Daryl snaps over his own shoulder, just as pissed as Rick over the needless punches he took in the arena.

“Hey, shut up!” Merle roars back, pushing away from the tree and trying to get at his brother, because he had a plan dammit, sure, he was still working out the finer details when Officer Friendly appeared but there’s no call for Daryl to question him in front of these pansies.

Rick spins, giddy as a merry-go-round, shoving Merle away from Daryl bodily, his voice a full-throttle roar.  “ _Enough!_ ”

“Hey, hey, hey,” Daryl warns, and covers Michonne again before she can slip past Rick and stab Merle in the chest. They heave back and forward in a riot of kicked up leaves and curse-words, a roiling body with six heads and no matching destination.  “Relax,” Rick barks out, and shoves Michonne backward three steps, facing outward once more.

“Get that thing out of my face,” Daryl explodes beside him, swatting at the gun again, and Rick thinks _can’t you see it, Jesus Christ; you have to be blind not to see it_.  _This isn’t going to work, there’s no variation of it that’s **ever** going to work._   Thirty seconds with Merle in their midst and it’s like a grenade exploded in front of Rick’s face.

“Looks like you’ve gone native, brother,” Merle crows.

His eyes slide to Rick - flat and dead - cold as a shark in temperate waters; the hate Rick feels toward him is reflected back a thousand-fold in that glassy stare.

“No more than you, hanging out with that psycho back there!”

It’s the only allegory Daryl’s made - to the bruises on Glenn’s chest and the simmering rage in the Korean’s voice, it’s the only concession he’s made to the haunted look in Maggie’s eyes, to the torture they both underwent - the anger in Daryl’s voice isn’t something he tries to hide, it lashes out like a whip, a firecrack over Merle’s skin.

“Oh yeah, he _is_ a charmer, I’ll give you that,” Merle allows, and flicks his tongue out between his teeth, shifting his attention to Michonne.  “Been putting the wood to your girlfriend Andrea big time, baby.”

A grenade, Rick thinks, probably isn’t explosive enough to describe Merle Dixon. 

The roller-coaster of emotions comes to a jarring halt – the shock of applied brakes leaves Glenn, Rick, and Maggie physically reeling – Merle’s grin widens a fraction, basking in a derailment that shifts the focus onto Michonne and away from himself.

“Andrea is in Woodbury?” Maggie whispers, utterly bewildered.

“Right next to the Governor,” Daryl confirms.

Merle stutters his hips forward, presses his lips together in a puckered kiss.

“You know Andrea?” Rick demands, wheeling on Michonne. “Hey, I said:  _do you know Andrea_?”

“Yeah, she does,” Merle relishes - airing her dirty laundry for all to see - making sure Merle Dixon’s not the only freak they’re staring at cross-eyed in these woods.  “Their bodies spent all winter curled up in the forest, um-mm-mm.  Yeah, my Nubian queen had two pet walkers, no arms, cut off their jaws, kept them in chains…kind of ironic now that I think of it.”

Daryl catches the look on Michonne’s face, her body stiff as an exclamation point, and slams a hand against Merle’s chest. “Shut up, bro!”

“Hey man, we snatched them out of the woods,” Merle protests, and shrugs with one shoulder, dislodging Daryl's hand.  “Andrea was close to dying.”

“Is that why she’s with him?”  There’s a stutter in Maggie’s voice, as if she finds it difficult to believe _anyone_ would want to be with the Governor, let alone a woman of Andrea’s intelligence. 

Rick hasn’t broken his gaze from Michonne, every misdirection, half-told truth, stacked up against her.

“Yep, snug as two little bugs.” Merle stares at the group, the double helix of tangled emotions spiralled upward and away. “What are you going to do now, Sherriff?” he whispers, because Merle isn’t the only one with a deft hand for manipulation.  “Surrounded by a bunch of liars, thugs and cowards!”

“Shut up!” Daryl insists.

The group is spent, the fight leached out of them, not a single counter-argument except his brother’s childish rejoinder, and that tune hasn’t changed in thirty odd years.  “Oh man, look at this, it’s pathetic, all these guns and no bullets.”

_“Shut up!”_

“Shut yourself up!” Merle roars and spins on him - tired of his damn bleating - trying to get Daryl to _understand_.   “You’re surrounded by a bunch of pussies, you moron – “

Rick pistol-whips him from behind. It’s the same move he performed on the rooftop in Atlanta, and Merle collapses with the same satisfying _thunk,_ boneless, limbs tangled everywhere.  Glenn, close to a fit, shudders at the sudden onslaught of silence, his knuckles are white on the grip of his hand-gun, his finger flexing around the trigger compulsively, a hairsbreadth from pulling it and blowing Merle’s skull apart.

Daryl squints at Rick.  He steps over Merle’s prone body, one foot on either side of his brother, and doesn’t move.   Maggie drags Glenn away, Michonne stalks toward the vehicle parked on the side of the road – it’s alarming in its own right – the keys are stashed on the front dash ready for a quick escape, and Rick watches her for a long drawn out moment until he’s satisfied she’s not going to steal the car and ditch them.  Merle groans, barely audible, rolling onto his back.  “Asshole,” Rick replies.

 

***

 

The second time around the discussion is a little more calm, Merle’s too busy vomiting his guts up in the woods, nauseas from the head-strike and still finding his balance, Michonne remains stationed by the car, body language that’s eloquent as a silent film, she has no intention of being left behind and has made it physically, _abundantly_ , clear. That only leaves the four of them in the discussion, the core members of the group, and they argue it out at a volume less likely to attract undue attention.  “It won’t work,” Rick insists.

“It’s gotta,” Daryl counters, just as stubbornly.

“He’ll stir things up.”  Hell, Merle barely got started earlier; give him half a day, and the entire prison would be at his throat.   Rick’s already gone through one alpha male keen to wipe the floor with him – given a dark clearing with no one else in sight - he doesn’t think Merle would hesitate the same way Shane had.

“The Governor’s probably on the way to the prison right now – Merle knows how he thinks – and we can use the muscle.” Daryl straightens, trying to keep his counter-arguments practical.  For all that Rick declared this group under the rule of a dictatorship he _listens_ when needed, he takes advice under consideration, and given enough time to mull it over, Rick inevitably makes the right call, even if there is a hiccup or two, the length, the time Rick takes to make the decision, is the only variable he has.  Daryl’s learnt patience in the last few months, in ways he thought he could never master. He’s calm, crossbow over one shoulder and his voice never slipping into agitation. 

Glenn isn't so zen.  “The guy had a gun to our heads,” he says urgently. “Do you really want him sleeping in the same cell block as Carol and Beth?”

Perplexed, Daryl steps back a fraction, because where the hell did that come from.  “He ain’t a _rapist_.”

“Well his buddy is.”

"They ain’t buddies no more - not after last night.”

And that’s the heart of it.  Merle cut all ties when he chose Daryl over the Governor’s order – there is no home for Merle, no shelter, no respite – with the mutilation of his hand, Merle wouldn’t survive alone in the wild longer than two weeks, that’s a cold fact. He wouldn’t be able to reload his weapon fast enough, and the bayonet doesn’t have the reach of a katana. He’d be forced to run – and Daryl knows his brother too well – running from a fight isn’t Merle’s style. Merle knew all of that too – weighed up the options in the arena when all he had to do was follow the Governor’s rule – fight to the death and his freedom won.  Merle said he didn’t have a choice, not really, not in the end, and neither does Daryl.

“There’s no way Merle’s going to live there without putting everyone at each other throats,” Rick declares.  He says it like it’s a predestined fact; something that can’t be reversed all altered.  On either side of Rick, Glenn and Maggie nod. 

 _You didn’t give up on me,_ Daryl wants to snarl, _why can’t you let it go?_   Daryl throws a hand out; not quite as calm as before.  “So what, you’re gonna cut Merle lose and bring last samurai home with us?”

“She’s not coming back,” Rick says, stony faced.

Maggie frowns and looks toward the car. “She’s not in a state to be on her own.”

And the pistol-whipping Merle took earlier didn’t do any damage to him either, Daryl bites back.

“She did bring you guys to us,” Glenn adds, no longer rigidly opposed now the topic’s moved from Merle.

“And then _ditched_ us,” Rick snorts, unimpressed.

“At least let my dad stitch her up,” Maggie argues. They owe their life to Michonne - both her and Glenn - if they can get the woman into the prison-grounds, the easier it will be to work Rick into a state of acceptance.  Maggie isn’t the type to leave her debts unpaid, beside her, Glenn nods in agreement.

Rick frowns.  “She’s too unpredictable.”

“That’s right, we don’t know who she is,” Daryl agrees. “Merle – Merle’s blood.”

“No, Merle’s _your_ blood.  My blood, my family, is standing right here and is waiting for us back at the prison.”

 _Gone native brother_ , Daryl hears in the back of his head, he unclenches his fist, one finger at time, and readjusts the crossbow on his shoulder.  A year ago, Daryl would have been laying into Glenn and trying to beat the snot out of him, and there’s still a part of Daryl that wants to rattle the younger man’s bones. _Why didn’t you bring him back?_ Daryl wants to holler. The moment you first ran into Merle, when he was alone and away from the Governor, why didn’t you bring him to me?  Half of this mess lies on Glenn’s lap, too, because it could have been so easily avoided.   Merle’s kin, there’s no way on earth Daryl would have refused to see him, and once away from the Governor, Merle would have vanished like a coyote from his rule.  Instead, Glenn didn’t reveal a damn thing to Merle other than his brother was alive, deliberately withheld his location, had the gall to ask Merle to trust him – _trust him_ – when Merle’s last known interaction with Glenn was seeing the entire crew run and leave him abandoned on a rooftop. Trust him?   If the situation were reversed, Daryl would have put his fist through Glenn’s face trying to find his brother.  The worse parts maybe – but not all of this lies on Merle - there’s blame scattered everywhere.  Something deep, tectonic, realigns in Daryl, he stares at the three faces opposed to him, opposed to Merle, and feels the tension fade away into acceptance.

Rick always had a talent for reading Daryl’s moods. He steps forward quickly, head lowered to catch Daryl’s eyes.  “ _You’re_ part of that family…he’s not…he’s not,” Rick pleads.

“Man, you ought to know,” Daryl whispers. He would have gone back to Atlanta alone to find Merle; he’s not repaying his brother with a death sentence now.  The prison’s the only harbor available, the only fortress with structural walls that offer a promise of security – and Daryl can’t sleep in his perch if Merle’s banished to the wild.   “Fine,” Daryl says evenly, and shifts away from them all.   “We’ll fend for ourselves.”

Glenn stutters, his eyes widen helplessly – in comparison, Rick looks as if everything he feared materialised before him.

“That’s not what I was saying,” Glenn tries.

“No him, no me.”  It’s an ultimatum, it’s the first time Daryl’s ever gambled on his own self-worth, and Rick looks like he’s shattering, eyes hooded and spearing into Daryl’s flesh.  _He came back for you last night,_ Daryl reminds himself, Rick came back when any sane person would have fled; no one’s ever thought Daryl was worth it before, and Daryl doesn’t know which brother he is betraying, pulled into opposing gravity wells and hollowed out.

“Daryl.” Maggie reaches out to touch his arm. She aborts the movement at the last second, lets her hand slip away.  “You don’t have to do that.”

It’s not about throwing around blame, it’s not about slinging mud, and maybe under Rick's guidance Daryl _has_ gone native, because that kind of bullshit helps no one. He’s not going to shatter the bridges he built with these people, he shrugs in response, dismissive, and looks between them quickly.  “It was always Merle and I before this.”

“Don’t,” Maggie repeats.

“Are you serious – you’re just going to leave, like that?”

“You’d do the same thing.”   If it were Maggie, if it were your kin, Glenn wouldn’t hesitate for a second, he can’t begrudge Daryl for doing the same thing – on the opposite side of the circle, Rick closes his eyes briefly.

“What do you want us to tell Carol?" Glenn hedges.

It’s a cheap shot as far as cheap shots go, Daryl holds Rick’s regard, his mouth curves in an upward tic, followed by a nod, so faint as to be nearly indiscernible.  “She’ll understand.”  The same way Rick does.  “Say goodbye to your pop for me,” Daryl says to Maggie, and cuts through the three of them, heading to the Hyundai to grab his kit. 

Michonne stirs away from the car as she watches them approach.  “Daryl, are you serious?” Glenn repeats, unbelievingly.

“Daryl!  Hey,” Rick catches up in three strides, he spins on his heel, walking backwards and staying apace with the archer, eye to eye.  “Hey, there’s _gotta_ be another way.”

Daryl slows; he studies Rick’s face for options, then shakes his head at what he sees.  “Don’t ask me to leave him. I already did that once.”

 _You said_ , Rick wants to scream; _you said you were with **me**._   He bites the words down until he’s choking on them – it’s a sentiment that’s childish, has no business being aired aloud - a dark maw of uncertainty opens up in Rick’s mind, trying to trip him over, he re-hashes new arguments in the hope Daryl will stop and listen. He’s always listened to Rick before, right from the start, even when they were opposed Rick could bring Daryl around to him.  “We started something last night, you realise that?”

They both know this isn’t going to be the end of the Governor - they both know the prison’s location is a known fact.

“No him, no me - that’s all I can say,” Daryl repeats, stubbornly, and grabs the kit from the rear of the car. Rick has only ever needed time to mull his decisions over, and Daryl’s going to give it to him – he always makes the correct choice in the end – Daryl hopes he sounds as assertive as he needs to be, he'll give Rick, Glenn, and Maggie the time they need to cool off, and he'll work on Merle in the meantime, keep the man circling the far outskirts of the prison – he talked a big game, but Merle wasn’t half the woodsman Daryl was – he wouldn’t recognise the geographical terrain, the creeks and mountains, if there were a map in front of him. Rick shakes his head once, his expression strained, and Daryl gentles his voice, tries to take the sting away, hopes to god he hasn’t closed this avenue off forever.  “Take care of yourself, take care of little asskicker, Carl, he’s one tough kid.”  It’s as close to goodbye as Daryl can make it. Merle’s grin is malicious, not aimed at his brother but centred on Rick, Daryl doesn’t look back, he slips into the woods with Merle’s arm flung around his shoulder – and he can’t tell who’s voice it is – Glenn or Rick’s, that echoes briefly behind him.

 

_“Daryl!”_

 

**Author's Note:**

> This was written in less than forty-five minutes, unedited, unbeta-read, and probably filled with grievous errors - feel free to point them out - if I inflicted them on you, you can swat me on the nose in return, fair's fair.


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